to spring!

You might say that spring began with a crash and a boom. In the wee hours of the morning we heard it -- the noise of something falling, breaking with a mighty crescendo. We rush downstairs, switching on lights. In the kitchen we see what has happened: Isis smelled cake on the table. Isis jumped up and pushed the cake plate to get to the stuff underneath the inverted glass salad bowl that I use to cover cakes. Pushed it hard, it seems. So that it toppled to the floor. And now here he is, amidst a million pieces of shattered glass, sniffing around for crumbs of olive oil/lemon cake. Isis!

It's cold outside. Twelve degrees to get us started. And yet, there is a robin on our crab apple (or hawthorn -- opinions vary). I haven't seen their red breasts here until now. Welcome robin! Ah, you're huddled into the warmth of your own feathers! I don't blame you.





Before I scoot off to teach, Ed and I plant tomato seeds (64 containers, 2 seeds each). Let me remember that I planted tomato seeds when the snow lay thick and heavy on the ground outside.




Breakfast. There is always breakfast.




Spring break for me starts tomorrow and so my next post will be from Paris. I'm not there for long -- under 24 hours, to keep ticket continuity (and the rate in check). Where to after that? Gargnano, on the banks of Lake Garda in Italy. Longterm readers of Ocean may remember that I was just there last spring break. When is it that I turned into a person who goes back to favorite haunts rather than searching out the new, the unusual?

I'll tell you when: when the joyful calm of a place sinks into my blood and stays with me months after the trip -- that's a destination worth revisiting.

Though Ed is staying home for this one, I am not going alone. In Milan (Friday) I'll be meeting up with my friend and actually, over the years, quite frequent traveling pal (and fellow blogger!), Diane. How's the weather over there, in northern Italy? Well, the good thing about leaving terribly inappropriate spring weather is that anything else is likely to be an improvement. I may have rains, but they'll be warm(ish) rains.

So, to spring, to spring break, to dishes not breaking, to new plant life and to many happy returns to places we grow to love.